Church and Change with a Special Focus on the Romanian Institutional Ecclesiology
Church and Change with a Special Focus on the Romanian Institutional Ecclesiology

Author(s): Dan Sandu
Subject(s): Christian Theology and Religion, History, History of Church(es), Special Historiographies:, Theology and Religion, History of Communism, Sociology of Religion
Published by: Editura Doxologia
Keywords: Orthodox Church; change; theology; Romanian history; Church history; communism; secularisation;
Summary/Abstract: Pre present context views the Church as a construct of human mind, promoting religiosity and a certain ritual (mostly needed by the people with no reference to a living God) whose main role is to provide social services in a given society, or, in a more plastic exposure, "the club of Christ". And this is in general accurate given that she passed through history making use of the same means and instruments of any human organisation. Her transcendent dimension was entrusted to the mystical minds and liturgists who defined her as a boat of salvation and the foretasting of the Kingdom. Is such an institution subject to change? If yes, what can be changed and when, in what extent and for what length? The study aims at a few attempts to accept change as a form of subsistence. The faithful have their own expectations from the main Church, the experiences of the Romanian Church members abroad bring new challenges facing this conservative institution. One cannot speak of real change, but rather an adaptation to the new context where the mythical approach of religion leaves more room for the rational approach and even to the pluralistic one. This is presented as the normal evolution of the future religion which expects to be more spiritual than institutional, in line with the new discoveries of neuroscience, evolution and hard sciences, towards an integral (even super-integral) approach.

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